Quick Post here guys. This is my new video webseries called “Vocal Tips For K-Pop Fans”, where I’ll be posting vocal tips for you guys weekly. Please leave a comment, subscribe and share it with others. Let me know if you have any questions and please give suggestions for future videos!

Oh wow, I should of really used this before I did this cover. Anyway, I know I’m really bad but here’s my cover. But I’ve practiced this for a long time I think my pitch was ok. I decided to do falsetto for the chorus. I hate my voice so much, it sounds so annoying to me. Idk why but it sounds nasaly to me but heres finally the cover. So sorry the dub didn’t fit lol(I got tips from YG)

If you just listen to me sing sounds ok I guess. But when you look at me it just makes it weird. I just ran out of battery for everything and i had to make this really quick. So this is just really weird for me. I’m sorry if I did not do pitch good but I tried my best and I think that’s the good thing. I know I lack control. I’m trying to fix it. Still improving btw great video!

You still do the timing thing with rushing a bit ahead of the lines, but some notes were kind of nice in your lower mix. Your pitch is MUCH better here actually! Also your timing is also better here, work on your diction a bit cuz sometimes you do these kind of exaggerated over pronunciations like 1:42 “A life time” and 1:45 “To be made whole” was rushed. 2:00 you were a bit late. Switching into falsetto worked well for you, so keep that up! Make your falsetto stronger, turn that into a strong head voice and that will help you have your mixed voice developed. 2:37 that note was the only note that was off key, it wasn’t the real the note in the melody. This is a good basic though! You can work on this song as you improve your technique, it’s challenging enough for your current skill, the pitch and timing were mostly good so this is a much better job! I was so pleased with this, you worked on the things you needed to work on, keep it up! ^ ^ Support the high notes okay? Don’t be too loud, don’t push too much. ^ ^

Ok, good! I’m proud of myself. Hmmm, now Little Apple. Everyone is asking me to do this song because the majority of my subscribetrs are from China. Here’s the song, do you think it’s good for me. It’s really a popular song in China. Oh I thinking to do Miniskirt by AOA too.

I know it is, I’m actually learning Chinese. I was thinking Every Night by EXID because it has rapping in it and I love the song but it’s so high. The mixing is so high. I don’t know how Solji can go SO high. She belts SO high. She always does Eb5’s and I’m like girl I barley can do that. I have never been able to go high in mixing or belting EVER. It’s sad.

Uh Im not sure what time is for what video. First video, she has F#5 in falsetto.
First video again, fell GOOOD before the hook, 0:55 E5, second video 3:34 E5, 1:07 C#5, 1:13 E5, third video lol What do you mean she sang it higher? There are definitely F5’s in..or wait was it F#5? The chorus has D5’s, yeah 2:37 F#5’s, 2:41 D5

WHOA, she goes so high. Then I would have a lot of F#5’s! I have every note down! Yeah this vocal range will be ready soon! I might of found her highest mixed note. I know she was not in EXID when she sang this song but she sang it this time. Listen closely it’s her voice.

1:01 I think it’s a E5 2:40-2:51 I think it starts out as a F5 then goes to a G5? This is pre-recorded so it’s still her singing
Sorry I keep asking for notes. What do you think is Solji’s supported range? How are those notes so easy for her to reach? I have trouble reaching high notes and I try not to strain so I make the note lower.

What I’m saying by easy is that she can reach high notes all the time. She might yell them but when she belts she stays in the 5th octave and that’s kind of hard for me but I think my mix is improving. So if that’s her supported range then she’s average to above average? I think that’s the right level. She’s better tan Minzy in my opinion and she should be Seohyun’s level.

Yeah I know what you mean. You need to mix more head-voice into your mixed voice. I think she may be above average, I’m not sure yet. I think she’s kind of better or similar to Jea, if Jea is AA then why couldn’t she? She’s better than most in betweeners I think. Don’t take my word for it yet, I’m not sure.

Cool! Yeah, I thought she sounds like Jea. The C5’s I have of her are actually supported so I think her supported range because she improved is G#3-C5. I think you at least have to have that supported range to be above average. I want to say that in your video when you were talking about rushing I can totally tell how I rush some songs. It came to me! I was like oh that’s what I do. So thanks for pointing that out in your video and it helped me a lot

Yeah I know you do that and I told you before and it’s a REAL basic of music/singing, so I thought it’d be a good idea to use that as a topic for the first video haha right? It helped, right? ^ ^ I hope it really makes things clear.

Yes, it helps. I remember a long time ago I heard Solji do a very low note but I can’t find it anywhere. I was going to ask you but let me find it first

I found the notes but after all they are not that low.
Low notes- 0:21 0:27 0:41 0:44 0:52 She does that airy thing before she does a low note but I think it’s a note, right?
Belts/Mixes- 1:30 1:33-1:37 1:42 I think these are pretty good notes so I will use them. Let me watch te rest of the video. I might ask you for a few notes in this video again in a few days, ok?

Ahmin or matheus…thank you for starting this segment. You dont know how much it has helped me in so many ways. Like ur analysis, ur explanation and teaching are also very detailed. U succeed in answering most of my questions just by in this one video. And for that i thank u sooooo much. Plz keep on doing this videos….i have waited soo long for this, i dont think there r much vocal trainers in youtube that i can understand, just because they dont explain things in details. We, ur avid supporters will support u always. However, dont be stressed out that much ok??
stay healthy and awesome. Wish u the best of luck on ur videos and analysis.
😊

Thank you so much for all your analyses and even taking the time out to give tips.
You don’t know how valuable this is to someone like me who desperately wishes to sing but cannot afford lessons… Yes, the internet is loaded with vocal lessons / singing tips, but these days, anyone and everyone seems to be a “vocal trainer” (if you know what I mean)… So it’s like a gift having someone I trust upload this!

Hi Matheus. I’ve been following this blog for a while now, but haven’t ever commented. I’m fairly new to singing, while I liked singing as a kid, I didn’t really start thinking about my voice until sophomore year of high school (I’m 17, a junior now). I’ve never taken voice lessons, so I’m not really sure what I need to fix. I’m in an a capella group at my school, and we went to a a capella competition for the first time a few weeks ago. While we were there, we had a counseling session with a vocal coach who said that singing too much in chest voice can damage your vocal cords. I tend to belt a lot, and I’m worried I could be ruining my voice with my current technique. This is kind of selfish of me to ask, but could you listen and tell me if my technique is damaging? Other advice would be greatly appreciated. Thank you so much for running such an awesome blog, btw!

Hi there!!! Thank you so much for the lovely comments of support and appreciation! As for your singing, it is not selfish at all for you to ask for help ^ ^ So first of all, if the vocal coach thinks you sing with too much chest voice, I have to disagree. I believe actually you have a more head dominant mix, your B4s sound on the edge of turning into a head voice. That is not to say you have no tension in your mix, more noticeably during the bridge and some of the other mixes, like before the second chorus, there was a bit of a high larynx and a bit too much of a push with volume. Due to your accent I do believe at times you didn’t open your throat enough and didn’t raise your soft palate enough to create a bigger fuller sound, but at times I believe I even heard resonance! Your F5s sounded like pure head voice to me, but yeah you have really nice pitch and you’re on the right track. You’re not bad vocally at all, I wish I could teach someone at your vocal level right now. ^ ^

OMG thank you so much for replying, you’re awesome! (And you replied so fast wow!!) I had no idea that my mix was head dominant. Are there some specific elements I should focus on to avoid tension in my mixed voice/in general? I also don’t know much about singing with vibrato – I feel like I force it sometimes, is that normal or should it come naturally? I found a more recent recording, if that helps. (The end is a little strange because the music cut off abruptly haha) Again, thank you so much! https://soundcloud.com/khusbu-blarg-patel/singing-got-better-2/s-4ePKb

Let me listen through this. I was on my phone so I figured why not reply lol Well it’s funny you’d think it’s not head dominant, I mean in this audio even more, during the chorus, you almost sound like you’re singing in your head voice actually. I actually believe in this one you were switching to head voice during the B4’s for pretty much every time, I think you’d need to work on supporting and stabilizing your voice more, so that your vibrato will flow more. Your runs also lose control when it comes to pitch and separation of notes. It’s okay that the music cut off lol

I have a few questions. First, what should I be feeling when I am properly supporting my voice? Second, what does a supported vs unsupported note sound like? Do you have any examples of that? And lastly, is doing “la” and holding the l and feeling the vibrations at the front of my mouth where my voice should ideally be placed?

Ease, you should hear and be able to feel that you’re not making much of an effort but your voice is strong and controlled. An unsupported note will sound flat, throaty, shallow, colorless, forced out, nasal, amongst other things, a supported note will sound connected, opened, it will flow naturally, it will sound light and effortless, strong. Well supported and unsupported notes, in the other video I posted about straining you can see explanations on that. La? I wouldn’t for La, I’d rather you do a muh, it makes you feel the vibrations better. (From experience.)

Vibrato feels, most of all, controlled. It’s natural, it’s easy, it’s not tense. It feels like you can control when to have it on and when to turn it off. If your voice is out of control and it shakes, that’s not a vibrato. To improve that, you have to work on relaxing, not trying to add too much air or force notes out, to breathe properly and to think always bright and opened. Shakiness is lack of stability, due to tension in the vocal cords and lack of stability with the throat that causes your voice to shake and be out of control. So just work on singing single notes and try to focus on doing them slowly, like do re mi re do, and do it slowly, note by note, and focus on keeping the tone straight.

Emotion? Of course not. I include dynamics and the use of the correct vocal textures, playing different sounds, airiness, strength, airiness, different degrees of mixing and all, but that’s all technical. I never judge a vocalist based on emotion, because I personally actually never feel any emotion from any vocalist, I feel emotions from specific songs when they’re sung right, but I wouldn’t judge a vocalist based on their “emotion” and if I did, that would be subjective. I can’t judge emotions because not everybody feels emotions the same way and there’s no correct way to judge emotions, there’s no theory or technique for emotions, if I did, then I’d be unprofessional. So short answer is no, I don’t include emotions, I only include musical interpretation, musicality and dynamic control.

Hey Ahmin/Matheus! So I commented a few months back on this post and I recorded another Ailee cover recently (what can I say, I love her ^^). I was wondering if you could give it a listen and maybe tell me what I have/should to improve on since then. Thanks for the awesome vocal analyses and videos, I really appreciate it! I always look forward to your analyses, they’re so detailed!! https://soundcloud.com/khusbu-blarg-patel/ailee-ill-show-you-cover

First thing I’d like for you to do for me would be finding an MR of the song on youtube instead of singing with the singer, though I can hear you, I’d rather you sing the song by yourself. I like your G3 in the pre-chorus, it wasn’t forced out or anything. For the mixed part in the chorus, I need you to bring up a little bit more of your chest voice upward so do slides that emphasize on enforcing more chest voice in your mix, drop your jaw more so you can have more freedom and less nasality in the softer parts. The upper parts, use more support, try to drop your knees and breathe into your diaphragm fully when you get to the high notes, just like squat down so you can use your back muscles more. Right now your mix feels very tight in your throat for the high notes since they’re so powerful, you need to yawn some notes out more…when doing warm ups so that you can relax the throat. This is a challenging song, I do like the head voice at the end.

1. I heard mariah placed her voice at her forehead, compared to other people who usually place it at their cheekbones. How do you placed it at the forehead? And whats the sensation?

2. Sometimes when i sing, i feel tight and tired at the mouth area. And it causes me to feel tired and cant hold my high notes that long, feel fatigue a bit. Is this what people call jaw and tongue tension? If so, how to eliminate them?

3. There are times when i can just sing the high notes like, quite easy. But there are times when i felt like its hard to support my voice, especially when im with an empty stomach. Is there a reason for these?

1. Basically from my own understanding of placement, we have nasal cavities that are located near our nose and our cheekbones, kind of in the middle, so the sensation of resonance and placement is more towards our mouth than towards our cheeks, in my own experience. Now as for head placement, we also have nasal cavities located in our forehead, very specifically above our temples. We can also direct the air into those cavities in order to produce resonance and place our voice, it creates a brighter sound and actually I tend to place my sound in my head somewhere around F4/F#4 as well. It just feels like instead of the sound being in your mouth, it’s suddenly behind your eyes, it’s a very interesting kind of pressure I feel, personally.

2. I would assume that would be jaw tension, probably tongue, but I’m not sure if your tongue is sliding back or getting tight. The way to fiix tongue tension is to simply stick it out of the mouth while you sing and try to keep it out and not let it slide back in, on vowel sounds. As for jaw tension, dropping the jaw and having your hands on your cheeks to keep the jaw dropped helps exercise the muscle memory of a more dropped and opened jaw position. If you do chewing exercises right before singing, that can help ease tension as you start singing as well.

3. Empty stomach is normal, singing is part of your body and muscles. If you eat a full meal, you won’t be able to carry on to go jogging or go to the gym, you’d have to wait beforehand. Same thing if you’re hungry. For singing it’s the same, however it’s more because it affects the lower area of your body where your diaphragm is located, so yes it has to do with your body being tired and you have to be well rested for singing, if you wish to sing well.

So thats why i get tired easily. Jaw tension… i dont think i have tongue tension that much cause i always sing in front of the mirror to make sure my tongue is sticking out. So the jaw is the prob huh? I’ll try and fix it.

btw, im interested with the head placement thing. To placed it forward at the cheekbones, in ur vid before u said to do the nasal naeng naeng?? exercise to bring it forward. Then do the chest exercise, to make the mix balanced (at least thats what i understood, sorry if i understood wrong). However, for head placement, does the same exercise is used, or is its different? Cause personally, i like the sounds coming from the head placement better than from the cheekbones. And how to shoot up air towards that placement?. Regarding placement, i understand the concept, but how to technically be conscious of doing it is still quite confusing for me.

Yes no you’re understanding it perfectly. For head placement, there’s a trick that involves putting your head down in between your legs when you sit on a chair and kind of bobbing it forward so as to “place” the sound and push it towards your forehead. It’s kind of a psychological thing really, but you can also raise your eyebrows to concentrate on the forehead and feel the air and direct it towards your soft palate in the back of your throat, so as to direct into your head. Those are ways that I use to find head placement. Tell me if these work for you! ^ ^

Hey ahmin,
i tried the head placement exercise you gave me, and guess what…it worked.
i can feel the air going to my forehead. The sensation like you said is like behind the eyes. I understand it now, but you know, my voice sounds a bit weird, like brighter, childisher and i dont know, nasal maybe? But i definitely lift my soft palate up and i sound like really loud, resonant , i think? It sounds quite different from when i placed it at my mouth. But its less tiring for me though. Do you know why is that?

Oh I’m glad haha many times people feel sensations differently so the behind the eye sensation sometimes doesn’t work the same for everyone. It’s less tiring because you’re not trying as hard when singing high, since the effort goes into the placement and it’s bright and eases up the throat, less chest muscle coordination, less work needs to be done for higher notes. Also the childish part is because it lacks the chest resonance so try to feel the chest vibration more to balance out the sound if you are trying to go for a less bright sound. ^ ^ Resonance is all about manipulating the direction of air into different resonance chambers.

Thanks ahmin, like really. I’ll try working on balancing my chest in the mix. . And who knows, maybe when im more confident with my voice and technique, i’ll send a video to you? For you to judge and see if im doing things right. Like really, thank you.
Ps: you’re a really good vocal teacher. I really hope you can be my trainer one day. ^_^

I do not plan to sing I’m just satisfied listening to music however, since I’m working on a call center that requires me to speak a lot, do you have any tips that would help maintain my voice… it becomes suddenly hoarse.. I know that you are a vocal trainer but any tips would be really much appreciated

Mhmm actually just simple lip trill warm ups would help a lot to keep your voice warmed up. Doing easy humming warm ups too, they all help. Make sure to drink a lot of water and even to learn to support so you don’t overwork your throat.

I have a question about the breathing (got a bit confused at 2:50). When you exhale, are you supposed to feel your stomach going inwards, and when you inhale, are you supposed to feel your stomach pushing out? Or does your stomach push outwards when exhaling and inwards when inhaling?

Hi Ahmin, I tried doing the first breathing exercise in the video but I can’t seem to inhale slowly without feeling some tension in my shoulders. I also can’t inhale for the full 5 sec duration but can exhale for a little more than that. I sometimes can also feel a little bubble like thing in the base of my neck. What am I doing wrong?

Try to focus on your belly expanding and finding different places for it to expand towards. So if you feel you’ve breathed all you could, try to find spots where you could expand more and focus down, so you can try to eliminate the tension on your shoulders. ^ ^

Thank you, I tried what you said and it did get a little better, guess I will just have to practice more. I have another question though, how do you control volume and pitch using breath? To my understanding, both depends of the amount of air that passes the vocal cords.

Yes if you keep your vocal cords together, more air, louder, less air, softer. The air and the pitch is a little less correlated, it’s more about the right amount of air since if you do push air, people have the tendency to go sharp in pitch. Not enough air, you can go flat but it’s also a muscle memory thing where your vocal cords may just not be trained properly to stay in the center of pitch.

I’m sorry but these videos are 40 minutes long each, I don’t have time right now. They also don’t include everyone and it’s not just idols and I’m not sure what the reasoning behind those grades D- and B- are, so I can’t really agree nor disagree with their methods. I don’t think Lim Junghee should be above Hyorin just like that but I don’t know, I didn’t watch everything. Why not just wait for our ranking chart to come out? ^ ^

I understand. You don’t have to reply anymore if you are busy but just to answer your questions. The videos itself also didn’t offer too much explanation into the rankings and the singers until grade A or above I think, just that it is based on pitch, range, resonance, support, musicality and all that stuff. The author placed Hyorin below Lim Junghee because Hyorin has an idol mentality and also because Lim Junghee has a better naturally born vocal condition (I am not sure if I conveyed this properly lol).

Oh I can reply to answer questions but a 40 min long video? That’s a bit much because it’s not smooth like Youtube, skipping was hard and so if I had to sit through an hour and a half of a video I barely understand, it’d be really tough. I think that kind of idea doesn’t make much sense, being an idol or having an idol mentality should have no influence on someone’s ranking if it has to do solely with vocal technique.

Oh sorry, I didn’t mean that you must watch the videos or anything. I was saying I understand that you don’t have time to watch the videos and it’s okay to not watch it. And then I just wrote a little explanation on what the video said because you couldn’t understand the video because of its language.

I found my way over here because I don’t know a thing about vocal technique and am rather curious lol

I have two questions– so breathing from the diaphragm/having a relaxed upper body is important. It’s the basics, and all… so I know you haven’t rated him yet, but does Kim Bum Soo support when he sings? I would think so, right?

I was watching his Fantastic Duo performance and his shoulders went up and down for breaths a few times, so I’m just curious about that…

the other is how can you tell when you support? I don’t have any vocal training or anything but I wanna try to learn at least basics like these for the sake of myself (and anyone hearing me wailing along to my favorite songs). I get breathing into the diaphragm but I just don’t really understand the concept of support I guess?

Improper posture may hinder breathing but it doesn’t mean the vocalist has no ability to support at all. He does have improper posture, as do many and even Park Hyoshin does as well. Support comes from the quality of the voice as opposed to watching the performance, but you can tell from the quality of their singing. It’s rough, kind of flat, kind of lacking in depth, in fulness. Hearing proper support is actually the last thing I learned to recognize, it is possibly the hardest to tell. It’s a dead giveaway but it took me a while to recognize the difference between supported vs non supported singing. Resonance? Strain? That’s easy to hear but very shallow support? It’s hard to tell. Airiness helps so like Suzy or Jungkook, but what about when they’re not airy at all? Take for instance Tey. Tey, the solo singer, he is SO rough and he lacks support throughout, he is full on throat. Support just really means the vocal cords are working alone without the throat muscles getting in the way, at least somewhere in your range.

oh my gosh PHS’s hairstyle haha! but ahh, I definitely hear that Tei is flat and throaty. But I wouldn’t be able to recognize it as unsupported or supported… I wonder why it’s so hard to tell? (also just curious… is Tei consistently unsupported and throaty like that, or is it just an old, bad performance? his recent Duet Song Festival performances definitely sounded better than that lol)

so is posture related directly to the whole breathing into the chest rather than the diaphragm? Since it’s not as natural to breathe into the diaphragm, having bad posture makes it more likely to just breathe normally?

Oh I know that hair is a mess. Well it’s something you have to slowly familiarize yourself with but Tei’s singing is completely not flat pitch wise, but flat in terms of tone. It’s closed, the whole time, it’s stuck in his throat. It’s super inward, it’s really lowly placed and it doesn’t project well. I haven’t heard him recently to be able to answer that question. Yeah bad posture doesn’t allow the air to flow as well as it would with good posture.

Yes no I know he was quite flat a few times…or many times. It was messy, quite so. I do hear some support, but it still seems shallow. He places the sound way too low, but he is more relaxed and brighter.

Hi ahmin3! I have a question, when I sing I tend to make some notes/words stand out more than they suppose to (especially during the longer notes). Is there any practices I can do to smooth that out?
Your analysis are really detailed and I really enjoy reading them! Good luck with the ones in the future!!!

Do you mean you emphasize syllables or you get louder on longer notes? I mean the issue is just self explanatory, try singing softer to control your voice. You’re overly relying on air pressure if you get louder and pushy on longer notes.

Hi Ahmin, it’s me again ^^ sorry for always disturbing hahaha
I’m wondering when you practice the diaphragm, how long is the ideal duration should be? I mean should I practice15 minutes, 30 minutes, or an hour each day?
Thank you!

For any exercise that I do, or warm ups in general, I like to spend a good 5 minutes with each for a total of at least 30 minutes of vocal exercises to get my voice worked on. So breathing can be about 5 minutes everyday, that is good enough.

Hey! You have a beautiful voice! There’s a bit too much breath being used in the higher notes, especially when you give up mixing and go up to your falsetto. Remember to not resist the upper range, don’t be scared of it. Train your muscles even if your voice cracks. The low notes, make them feel higher, closer to your mouth and enunciate clearly. Be clear!